Tennessee Titans quarterback Cam Ward completed a few more passes in his second preseason game. He still didn’t do much to assuage any concerns that he isn’t making any strides going into his second season.
Sunday night’s game was the first time Ward has played a standalone game in the NFL; the Titans didn’t have one last season and the preseason game against the Seahawks was on Fox in primetime. It wasn’t a great close-up.
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Ward, the first overall pick of last year’s draft, completed some quick passes but made very little happen. He still looked fairly uncomfortable unless he was unloading the ball right away on his first read.
Ward finished 8 of 12 for 69 yards. He was taken out before the second quarter was halfway done. The numbers weren’t bad, but he wasn’t impressive.
Ward completed the simple passes on his first drive, which came against the Seahawks’ backups. He got the ball out fast on a few run-pass option plays. He hit Tony Pollard on a flare route out of the backfield and Pollard turned it into a 33-yard gain after a Seahawks defender fell. Ward took shots downfield but was off. Rookie Carnell Tate couldn’t bring in a pass that was a little too far outside. He threw downfield and missed whoever his target was by a few yards. Then Elic Ayomanor beat his man but Ward didn’t put enough on it, and Ayomanor didn’t get a pass interference penalty on the underthrow either. The Titans settled for a field goal.
The only completion Ward had of more than 9 yards was the play to Pollard, which Ward had very little to do with other than getting the ball out fast to his running back.
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Ward completed two short passes on the next drive, but his third-and-2 pass to Tyjae Spears was short of the first down. Then Spears was stopped short of the first down when the Titans went for it on fourth down.
The next drive, everything Ward completed was short and quick. When he tried to go downfield on third down, he threw quickly to a heavily covered Calvin Ridley and it was knocked incomplete, though Ridley drew a pass interference penalty to keep the drive going. Ridley almost lost a fumble when he was scrambling and the ball was poked out from behind, but it went out of bounds. He did scramble and find tight end Gunnar Helm downfield, but the pass was late and Helm couldn’t stay in bounds. It was a nice throw but ultimately didn’t matter because it came too late.
Tennessee Titans quarterback Cam Ward got the start against Seattle in a preseason game on Sunday night. (AP Photo/George Walker IV)
(AP Photo/George Walker IV)
In last week’s game, Ward and the Titans faced the 49ers, who didn’t use starters. Ward struggled against San Francisco’s backups. He missed many passes and one one late pass to the middle, he almost got intercepted. He went 5 of 12 for 57 yards.
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Based on playing in a new offense, coordinated by Brian Daboll, and perhaps the struggles of last week, Titans coach Robert Saleh said the starters might play the whole first half in their second preseason game. They played into the second quarter but not the whole half.
Ward is coming off a rookie season in which he had some highlights, but also struggled on the whole. The environment around Ward was bad, and that has been upgraded. But it was concerning that Ward looked uncomfortable in the preseason opener. Saleh said he was not worried about that, and Ward just needed more “time on task.”
Ward still needs to seem some more of that time. But there is only one preseason game left, and many teams don’t use starters in the preseason finale. At this point, Ward hasn’t shown many signs that this regular season will bring the breakout that the Titans were hoping for.
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